Doctoral Dissertation Research: Ritual Feasting and Redistribution in Rural Fiji: Empirical Tests of Evolutionary Hypotheses.

University Of Connecticut, Storrs CT

Investigators

Abstract

Doctoral student John H. Shaver (University of Connecticut), supervised by Dr. Richard Sosis, will undertake research on human cooperative behaviors and the redistribution of resources to others. Why humans give away useful resources, such as food and material possessions, has been of longstanding interest to anthropologists. Considerable research has examined the ability of anthropological models to explain resource transfers in the context of food sharing, labor, foraging, warfare and other domains of social behavior. The proposed research aims to extend these empirical findings and examine an economic system where contributions to public feasting and redistribution events are common. Specifically, this project will evaluate the ability of five social science theories to explain why individuals donate to collective pools for feasting and redistribution in a traditional society. The research will be conducted in three rural villages located on the southern coast of Vanua Levu, Fiji. Quantitative and qualitative methods will be employed and data collection will include: quantitative data on resource transfers associated with redistribution feasts, demographics, fertility, and household economics, and qualitative data on norms associated with feasts, the relative prestige of village members and their willingness to come to the social assistance of other village members. This research is important because it will improve our understanding of the relationship between institutional context and human cooperative behavior. Understanding human motivations for cooperation and how institutions influence human cooperation are crucial for explaining such wide-ranging phenomena as warfare, environmental conservation, and public health-care. This research also supports the education of a graduate student.